Last week I had a student announce, "I did some lateral reading on the man I went out with last night"—and she discovered that he was on the sex offender list! Well, that got the class’s attention in a way that my discussion of lateral reading never did.

It’s safe to say that I will be using her testimonial on lateral reading for the rest of my teaching career.

It’s only the best day of the year!

And it only happens every other year—The Biennial Writing Teachers Conference!

Come enjoy thought-provoking, rejuvenating presentations from 9-12 pm and then join us at the Hinckley building for our second annual Adjunct Faculty Award Luncheon. Cha cha cha!

Remember, if you’d like to present at the conference, submit your proposal by March 15. Also be sure to keep an eye on your email for the official invitation to the adjunct faculty award luncheon—a perfect ending for the conference, for the semester, for the academic year!

Thanks to the HBLL, you and your students can read the NYT for free!

Alert Advocate reader Tyler Gardner, the director of the excellent and helpful RWC, sent me this happy news last week:

“The HBLL changed The New York Times subscription policy earlier this year. Instead of the 24-hour passes they used to have (that required using the library website), students and employees can now sign up for direct digital access to The New York Times app on their phone or NYTimes.com . . . Students have access until 12/31 of the graduation year they choose and can reauthorize if needed, and employees only need to renew every few years.”

Woohoo!

Here’s how to set up your account:

1. Sign in to the library website, so it knows you’re a BYU person.

2. Then go here.

3. Click on the second link (Miscellaneous EJournals), which should take you to the NYT sign-up page.

4. Sign up using your BYU email address.

5. Voila! NYT for free!

Now while I will always be loyal to my Washington Post, I have signed up and plan to encourage (okay, harangue) my students to sign up as well because we need newspapers and newspapers need us!

Course coordinators = Teaching consultants

Need help crafting a new assignment and rubric? Not sure what to do about a student? Want some new ideas?

Live boldly and send your course coordinator an email to set up a time to meet—they’ll be happy to hear from you and be willing to help! Trust me on this. The conversations I have with them at University Writing’s course coordinator meetings are always thoughtful and helpful.

Also Brian Jackson, BYU’s Writing Across the Curriculum consultant, is available to talk with you about teaching writing, writing assignments, or teaching in general. At this point in his career, he is interested and focused on teaching—the same as most adjunct faculty! Yay! You can stop by during his office hours, Wednesdays, 2-4 pm—or email him with 3-4 other times to meet and he’ll find one that works.

Stuff for your calendar

Be sure to read over our calendar—lots of good stuff happening this month! Remember, you can now see our adjunct faculty happenings on the department Google calendar—our events are in green: The English Department Calendar. (Thank you, Juli Todd!)

MARCH

March 15: The Biennial Writing Teachers Conference proposals are due! Please consider presenting!

March 21: Mental Health Chat. Join fellow adjunct faculty and grad students in B106 JFSB at 11 am for a helpful Q&A with Husband Jon Cox, a psychologist at CAPS. The title of this chat is “Your Mental Health Matters Too!”—an important topic to discuss!

March 27:  Adjunct Faculty Book Club Lunch. We’ll talk about Verified over lunch at noon in B114 JFSB. Be sure to RSVP by the end of today (March 8)!

March 28: Student Ratings Start! Encourage your students to complete ratings for all of their classes, but especially yours. Inspiration works best with information!

APRIL

April 3: Withdrawal Deadline. Use the week before this date to have the a-W-is-better-than-a-F conversation with your students who have many absences and/or are failing. You’ll be grateful you did.

April 18: The Adjunct Faculty Biennial Conference! One of the best days of the year! Great presentations with new ideas and strategies! Please come! Your teaching lamp will be refilled!

April 18: The Adjunct Faculty Award Luncheon! After the biennial conference, we’ll meet for lunch at noon on the third floor of the Hinckley Center to celebrate all of our good works! Put it on your calendar today!

April 18: Student Ratings Close. Perhaps request a rating analysis from the Center for Teaching & Learning SCOT program—and go for the big picture: ask them to sort and categorize your last three years of student ratings (don’t worry if you’ve been at BYU that long :).

April 30: Grades DUE by NOON!

Our makeshift website

As I’ve noted before, Ansalee Greenwood, Greyson Gurley, Kelsey Smith, and I are hard at work writing content for our Adjunct Faculty Website (and we are continually surprised at how much stuff we need to cover!). Until this website is up and running, here are links to some helpful Google docs (which you can also find in your “swag” folder that’s sitting in your mailbox right now):

Adjunct Faculty Sunshine Fund

Book and Travel Stipends

How to Train to Teach Other WRTG Courses

Meet Your Course Coordinator

Observation Opportunities—sign up to be observed or find someone to observe!

Syllabus Requirements: I just added another option—the RWC’s official syllabus statement that you’re welcome to customize!

Write NOW!—want to get some of your own writing done? Write NOW! can help!